Friday, October 30, 2015

The Royal Navy Echo-class survery vessel HMS Enterprise (H 88) sailed into Valletta Port (the Grand Harbour) this morning on a courtesy visit. This is her fourth visit in Valletta Port this year.The British survey vessel is presently berthing at Palumbo SY (in Dock-5, French creek), and she's expected to sail from Malta in the coming days. (30-Oct-2015)

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

The Armed Forces of Malta (AFM) signed a contract for the provision of the third Maritime Patrol Aircraft funded by the E.U. 2014-2020 Internal Security Funds. The contract was signed in the presence of Aerodata President and CEO H. J. Stahl, Commander of the Armed Forces of Malta Brig J. Curmi and other high ranking members of the AFM.

This aircraft will join the two King Air B200 fleet already in the AFM’s possession and will come complete with integrated systems and a service support package strengthening the current fixed wing fleet’s role of protecting the southern external borders of the E.U. The specialised mission system equipment integrates a belly mounted radar, a Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR) system, SAR direction finder and a number of other sensors and communication equipment including satellite communication and data transmission.

The aircraft will be modified at the Aerodata’s facilities at Braunschweig airport in Germany. The third King Air B200 aircraft is expected to be delivered in 2017. (Source: Armed Forces of Malta,

Sunday, October 25, 2015

Ryanair has launched its new route between Rome-Ciampino and Malta IAP this afternoon. The first scheduled flight, operated with Boeing B737-800 (EI-ESM), landed at Malta IAP around 1440lt. It re-departed to Ciampino after a quick turn. Ryanair will be operating six-weekly flights the two airports this winter (no flights on Wednesdays). (25-Oct-2015)

Thursday, October 22, 2015

KLM and Air Malta have inaugurated
their code-share agreement today. The code-share, which started this
summer, saw KLM placing its code and flight numbers on flights operated
by Air Malta between Malta and Amsterdam. This agreement has enabled KLM to
offer its customers daily services between Amsterdam and Malta. Air
Malta’s flights to/from Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport connect with KLM’s
extensive global network. Customers of both airlines are benefitting
from new services, such as through check-in for passengers with
connections. (Source: Air Malta, 21-Oct-2015)

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

On Oct. 15th M.C.M.'s new hangar in
Malta opened its doors for the first aircraft, scheduled for maintenance works. In the light of increased
aviation traffic and demand for hangar space and aircraft maintenance services
M.C.M. Group invested in an additional 2,400 square meter hangar, adjusted to
its existing Maintenance facility at Malta IAP,
allowing work to be completed simultaneously on three of the Bombardier Global
Series and the New Bombardier C-Series .

The opening of the new hangar
marks the end of the first phase of the expansion project that the M.C.M.
initiated in 2014. In the coming months
the Group is looking forward to the finishing works of the 630 square meters
customer service centre, 2280 square meters, workshops, offices and the state
of the art training facility adjusted to the hangar. With the completion of
this project M.C.M. Group will offer a truly one-stop shop for all your
aviation needs from its Maintenance facility at Malta IAP. (Source: M.C.M. Group, 19-Oct-2015)

Friday, October 16, 2015

Audited figures announced during today’s Air Malta AGM show that the airline
posted a loss of €16.4 million for the year ending March 2015 and is set to
reduce its losses to €4 million by 2016.Now in its fifth year of the
European Commission's restructuring plan, the company was supposed to break even
and return to profitability by next year. But an optimistic chairperson Ms M. Micallef said that in its final year of the
European Commission's restructuring plan, the company kept its losses down to
€16.4 million despite the closure of the Libya route and a drastic drop in
passengers from Russia following the Ukrainian crisis. The losses from the Libyan and Russian markets amount to some €10 million but this has been offset by savings in other areas, including fuel costs. Results for the
first six months of the current financial year show that the company has
increased its profits by €8.7 million when compared to the same period of the
previous year. If these results are maintained the airline is in line to reduce
its losses to €4 million.

Noting the company's "economies of scale
disadvantage" she said a strategic alliance would "change all this" adding that
Air Malta has the potential to become part of a wider network with the clout to
command prices. "Such an alliance would feed our network and ensure the
much required increase in passengers and revenue," she said. (Source: maltatoday.com, 15-Oct-2015)

Thursday, October 15, 2015

Ryanair will be operating nine new routes to and from Malta next summer,
bringing its total of destinations from the island to 36 – two more than Air
Malta. The airline said this was being done through an investment of $100
million. The new routes are Baden, Berlin, Cologne and Dusseldorf in Germany, Gdansk
and Poznan in Poland, Manchester, Rome and Budapest. The airline is also increasing the frequency of its flights to Birmingham to
three times weekly, Edinburgh to five weekly and London to daily. Ryanair would have an additional aircraft based here, bringing the total to
three. (Source: timesofmalta.com, 14-Oct-2015)

Friday, October 9, 2015

September was
the third month in a row this year to have seen more than 500,000 passengers
passing through Malta IAP, creating a three-month record streak that had never
been seen before. For the first time ever, more than 1.6 million passengers
travelled through the airport in just three months: July, August and
September.

With a total of
502,823 passengers travelling through the airport last month, this marks an
8.6% rise over the number of passengers at Malta IAP when compared to September
2014. The average seat load factor for the month, which measures the
number of filled seats on every flight, rose marginally to 85.8% last month.
The increase in passengers for September is relative to the 8.5% rise in seat
capacity over last year. Aircraft movements also registered a 10.8% growth,
which is mostly attributed to the new seat capacity secured this year with the
addition of new airlines operating to and from Malta.

The top 5
markets remain the U.K., Italy, Germany, France and Spain. Significant growth was
registered on British and Italian routes with an increase of 7.4% and 12.9%
respectively. German passengers recorded a drop of 4.4% due to fewer aircraft
movements to Frankfurt and Munich while the French market marked a marginal
decrease of 1.5%. Traffic to and from Spain was reduced by 10% due to a
reduction in seats on the Barcelona and Gerona routes.

Outside of the
top five markets, other destinations are registering noteworthy growth –
traffic to and from Turkey has more than doubled over September 2014, while new
traffic from Switzerland and Poland have generated 26% and 33% growth
respectively.

Up until the
Sep. 30th, Malta International Airport hosted 3,623,663 passengers - a growth
of 7% over last year. Aircraft movements grew by 5.7% while seat capacity
increased by 4.7%. The seat load factor also rose to 81.3% compared to 79.6%
last year.

In September the
maximum take-off weight (MTOW) increased by 8.9%, and cargo and mail increased
by 1.5%. (Source: maltairport.com, 8-Oct-2015)

Friday, October 2, 2015

Volotea will be operating
flights between Malta and Catania from next year. There will be flights on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays starting from
Mar. 24th with fares starting from €19.99 one way, tax included. Commercial country manager Valeria Rebasti said the airline hoped to launch
flights to other destinations in the coming years. She said Malta was the first international route the airline was operating to
from Catania airport. (Source: timesofmalta.com, 2-Oct-2015)